Wednesday, July 26, 2017

U.S. tussle to be NAFTA negotiator

Wilbur
Ross, a billionaire investor and close friend of U.S. President Donald Trump, had
originally been given the authority to reshape NAFTA and other trade
deals to protect U.S. industries and jobs, but now has been ousted in
favour of Robert Lighthouse.

Ross
is U.S. Commerce Secretary; Lighthouse is the U.S. Trade
Representative.

Lighthizer
is a more experienced trade negotiator and more comfortable with
Washington politics, has persuaded the White House to let him run the
NAFTA file without having to answer to Mr. Ross.

Sources
say the White House has told Canadian and Mexican officials to deal
only with Mr. Lighthizer, a veteran trade lawyer and negotiator who
worked in the Reagan administration.

Mr.
Lighthizer has also made it clear to Foreign Affairs Minister
Chrystia Freeland that he only answers to the President and Congress,
sources say.

Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau said this week he will not allow the U.S. to
scrap the NAFTA provision for a disputes-settlement system, a point
that former prime minister Brian Mulroney gained only because of
last-minute insistence.